Derek Williams is a co-owner and Director of Sales for Amendment II American Armor, a company dedicated to providing better ballistic protection to law enforcement, military, and law-abiding citizens. Amendment II teamed up with the Nano Institute of Utah at the University of Utah to create the world's first carbon nano tube armor material, RynoHide, which was released to the public in April this year. Amendment II's engineers and the researchers at the Nano Institute of Utah are exploring emerging technologies and seeking ways to implement them in the armor and personal protection industries. Derek has a technology and marketing background having founded a web development and marketing firm in a previous life. He grew up in San Antonio, TX, studied Military Science and International Law at Brigham Young University and is married with 6 kids. His wife is the leading candidate for "Mother of the Year" award, as Derek is currently taking his family on a year-long road trip in an RV, home schooling the kids while promoting RynoHide to law enforcement, military, and civilians all over the country.

RYNOHIDE WITH CARBON NANOTUBES

Since their discovery in the early 1990’s scientists have been
fascinated by Carbon Nanotubes. They are as light as air, stronger than
diamonds and can be as flexible as rubber. This makes them perfect for
enhancing the performance of body armor such as: vests, helmets, gloves
and pants. Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are five times less dense than steel
and approximately 30 times stronger this makes them the ultimate
mechanical filler for reinforcing polymers like aramid fibers such as
Kevlar without adding extra weight.

The problem with using these tiny miracles of unimaginable strength
has been the enormous cost to produce them, the fact they can only be
made in relatively small quantities at a time, and are complicated,
expensive, time-demanding processing techniques needed to properly
integrate them into ballistic materials. The result is that NO other
body armor companies offer CNT re-inforced armor. Instead they produce
armor that weighs more, is much thicker, isn’t as strong, or as light
and flexible. Until now.

Amendment II scientists and engineers are extremely excited to be the
first to discover, perfect and use a process of mass manufacturing of
affordable CNT based armor. Until now, all existing methods of
fabricating CNT-polymer composites involve quite complicated, expensive,
time-demanding processing techniques such as solution casting, melting,
molding, extrusion, and in situ polymerization. In all of these
techniques, nanotubes must either be incorporated into a polymer
solution, molten polymer or mixed with the initial monomer before the
formation of the final product (e.g. yarn, ribbon or film). In addition,
these methods cannot be applied in the case of insoluble or temperature
sensitive polymers, which decompose without melting.

Amendment II’s new armor, Rynohide, is the world’s first commercially
available cost effective Carbon Nanotube armor and is much: lighter,
stronger, more flexible, thinner and has less much less back-face
deformation (how far the bullet pushes into you), which means it hurts
less when shot.

What does all this mean to you? If you are ever going to buy body
armor make sure it has been made using Carbon Nanotubes. Your life could
depend on it.